To Someplace Better
by a-MAXiMINalist
Summary: In the wake of Riley's reunion with Mom and Dad, Joy struggles to break the news of Bing Bong's demise. Vowing to preserve his memory, they knew they must escort Riley to someplace better without him. Based on a suggestion by Queenbean on Tumblr.


_On Tumblr, I came across user Queenbean03's post: "I want a fanfic where Sadness asks Joy what happened to Bing Bong. And as Joy tells her about Bing Bong's last moments she starts to cry and Sadness is stunned to see Joy so sad..." There was more, ending on, "And one night as Riley is getting ready for bed she looks out her window and sees the full moon shining in the night sky, and she's not sure why but it makes her feel like crying and smiling at the same time."_

 _And I thought, I want this fanfic too. And like an idea bulb jammed into my dashboard slot, I knew I had to take a break from writing Monsters University fanfiction._

 _I do not own any of the Pixar characters here._

 _I also have to make note that fellow writer and friend UntoldStories113 just released "Sugar Moon," which had a similar premise. Do I really have to state the obvious and recommend it? Her language and canon-complying set-ups are almost impeccable._

 _ _So Queenbean, I hope you find justice in this rendition of your (and many other Tumblr users who Reblogged that post) wishes.__

* * *

 **To Someplace Better**

By the time the viewfinder winked into sleep mode, the final memory rolled out blue and gold, containing the silhouetted shapes of Mom and Dad, sitting at the bedside, stroking Riley's hair.

The routine of falling asleep was so placating that Joy nearly uttered, "We're out" as usual. But not tonight. Something disturbed this mild temptation to act out routine.

"You can take the night tasks," she whispered to Sadness, who was staring at the blank viewfinder.

She wanted to compensate, occupy Sadness more to do. Besides, she did needed a break.

Sadness eyes lit up at this prospect, nodding like an eager child ready to tear open Christmas presents.

Tearing away from the dashboard, Joy flashed Disgust, Fear, and Anger her well-done-for-the-day smile. How she missed them. Even in their relieved smiles, they seemed exhausted and in need of an embrace.

They were smiling all right, but not to reciprocate to her. They went past her to Sadness. And she didn't mind. This fleeting isolation could give her some time alone.

She peered out into the new Family Island with the Golden Gate bridge. She felt the breeze from the open circular hole where Disgust and Anger cut through to rescue them.

Although the original, now blue core memories, and Sadness's own core memory, had been set aside. Sadness had insisted on gradually reinsert them one by one in the morning so not to overload the system. Let Riley take it slow, Sadness cautioned.

Behind her, she could hear the rhymic beats of routine-of rejected memories sliding down the shelves like descending plinks of a xylophone and the long-term orbs wisping over through the tubes over the new Family Island like shooting stars with known destinations.

Joy could hear was the others, Anger, Fear, Disgust, offering Sadness with overdue congrats. She did not look back. She only looked at the dark expanse of the long-term labyrinth, the orbs glistened in their clusters. She stared into the dark pit of the Forgotten, perceiving the dark beads of dying memories.

Oh, why did he fade? Oh why couldn't he see Riley's happiness now? Why did Riley felt so subconsciously done with him that he felt his only option was to take it with a smile? Didn't he deserve better?

In the reflection on the window, she could fathom the blue figure of Sadness dispersing from the group.

What was she going to say? A thanks? A congrats? They had plenty of time to talk later.

"Joy."

"Yes, Sadness?" She wanted to turn so she might see her face. But Sadness didn't need to get distracted from her happiness with her grief. This was Sadness's moment. She had been a load to Sadness. Sadness deserved to have her triumph unspoiled.

"I just want to say, thanks."

Why was Sadness thanking her? "No really, thank you. Riley needed you most."

"I-I-I wish Bing Bong could see how happy she is now."

Joy shuddered.

"So, there's something I've been meaning to ask." Sadness had this blubbering stammer. Joy had prayed that she wouldn't notice his absence.

"Bing Bong? He..." She almost darted her head in Sadness's direction. "He-he, I'm sorry, he won't come back."

She could hear the gushing tears and sniffling. She always abhorred Sadness's chronic sobbing, but it was now for a different reason. She was sad this truth hurt Sadness and chided herself for its blunt delivery. "I'm sorry."

"I, I, knew," Sadness stammered.

"You knew?" Wait, so Sadness inferred that he was gone? But did she know the circumstances? Could she handle the circumstances?

"It's just that..." she choked. "When you ran to find me, I saw that he wasn't with you."

Joy's knees couldn't support her anymore. She fell toward the glass for support. Was this how Sadness always felt? Nothing but the ground for her support whenever she felt droopy? The feeling that if there wasn't a ground, she would let herself plunge further? She could hear Sadness stepping forward.

"W-w-w-we were trapped down in the memory dump. We dug his rocket from the pit. Of course, we decided to fly out together. We sang the song together. We did it twice. Then a third time, and then... I was up there. We made it, I thought. But it was only me. Only me who made it." She remembered the rocket getting lighter on the last flight and the distinct peak of exhilaration when the rocket hit the surface and being so swept up in anticipation of triumph that she barely noticed that he didn't join in but urged her to continue with song. "I thought he was with me when we were up there."

"He fell off the rocket... no, jumped off, threw himself off." Somehow, she preferred to think of the fall as an accident. But no, from the deliberate celebratory jig in the pit and insistence for her to save Riley, it was difficult to deny that it was all intentional on his part.

"Then I looked back. He was still in the pit. We wanted me safe. So he thought, thought..." How would she explain this? "He thought the rocket needed less weight. He didn't even consult me on it. He jumped in with me and flung himself off."

The patter of Sadness's feet was getting closer.

She remembered the way he held out his free hand to help her up after their second crash. "I've got a good feelings about this one." He knew there was no time for him to explain it or to let her feel the weight of what he was going to do. He wanted to spare her. Oh why, but she couldn't blame him, he only wanted to act out of urgency. Riley was his first priority. But why couldn't Bing Bong be allowed to live through the urgency too? He deserved to resume his part in Riley's happiness.

"I'm so sorry," she breathed. "Had I known, I would done something so the both of us will be here!"

Joy felt like the glass wall could shatter at any moment if she fell forward. But she had this impulse to cling onto something, something other than the floor to fall on.

Sadness was the nearest to her. Due to Sadness's shortness, she had to kneel down to sink her face into Sadness's collar.

Sadness clung back. "Oh, Joy. It's not your fault."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry."A pang of perplexity struck Joy. She realized she wasn't apologizing just for Bing Bong, but also because she was breaking down in front of Sadness. She knew that was irrational, but for some reason, it didn't hinder the shame. She learned, hours ago, Riley needed the outbreak of tears, realized the need to think over despair. Why did she feel shame over something that was beneficial?

"We didn't know him for so long." The collar dampened in her tears. "We came all this way, we met him, and he left us so soon."

Sadness dipped down to stroke Joy's hair. "I... I... barely knew him. I wish I spent more time with him." It occurred to Joy that the only direct interaction Sadness ever shared with him was by the pit, as they watched his rocket tumbling into darkness. "I wish I was there for him. I-I think he might have needed me down there."

"He was happy. Happy that Riley could have me back." He went out with a smile. "He was happy to at least have a ride on the rocket." She almost uttered, Bing Bong said, give my regards to Sadness, he was thinking of you too. "He would want you to be fine too."

No doubt Bing Bong would recall Sadness, the one who comforted him. Unfair, she knew. To presume what Bing Bong was thinking in this drastic situation down in the dumps. She knew it was likely that Bing Bong only had her and Riley in mind at that time. Sadness too, but maybe, due to her absence, he had other urgent matter of escaping in his head. But she knew also that Bing Bong probably would have openly regarded Sadness had tragedy not claimed him so soon.

By the time she unburied her face from Sadness's sweater, she saw an astonishing sight.

Anger, Fear, Disgust, watching her silently through drowsy eyes. They had been voiceless, paralyzed by the sight of their leader's collapse.

Joy's first instinctive feeling upon exposing her stricken face was the return of shame. They had relied on her all these years. They deferred to her smiles sometimes. She could see the lost looks on their faces. She almost recoiled when they headed over, unused to them ever initiating willing physical contact with her.

Disgust was the first to take even a step forward.

But it was Fear who embraced her first. He was always jumpy about what he considered to be urgent matters. What this so urgent to him? Fear was clinging as if never confronted with such a hazard that wasn't safe to let go of. He squeezed her a little too tight, as if a looser grip would never be adequate enough.

Over Fear and Sadness's shoulders, she could see the stunned pout on Disgust, biting her trembing lips, and she took baby steps toward her as if dragging a limp in her ankles. Anger mouthing something out, perhaps some curse word, not out of his usual giddy malice but apprehensiveness.

Disgust gave her a paused look because she did not even seem to recognize her with tears. Joy feared that Disgust might cry too. Disgust did give a reflexive hiccup of a sniffle before embracing her too.

Anger was the last to join in, simply patting her on the back, feigning apathy with a causal whistle before he gradually wrapped his arms around everyone, cautious that his skin would burn them upon his physical contact. Anger's joining touch finalized this accumulating warmth. It was like she could fall into a peaceful slumber in their warmth, like the time Riley curled up by the fireplace sipping hot cocoa with Mom and Dad back in Minnesota and forgot about the disappointment of a canceled hockey match.

"All right, guys, Fear, you can stop suffocating me now." It took time for Fear to relax and let go.

It was safe for them to share a mutual chuckle right now. Joy didn't honestly understood why laugher reflexively followed this moment. All she knew was that it was relief, something like the time Riley tumbled down the stairs when she was four, and stood up, realizing that she was going to survive.

It was time for everyone to catch up on memories. Fear alluded to seeing him last in the Dream footage, to which Joy, who could now allow herself a sheepish smile, clarified the event. He was surprised that he was still around at that time, saddened that it was the last he would remember of him.

Bing Bong, Disgust muttered, his music so corny but I guess that's why I always did love it, even if I didn't know this until now. Bing Bong, mused Anger, that song, I could replay it a hundred times over the gum commercial. I really liked that rocket too. Bing Bong, lamented Fear, I remember, we all felt safe in his - the flannel security blanket that Riley make-believed was his fuzzy hug - from the thunderstorms.

"Bing Bong wanted to take Riley places, I just wish he could be there."

"We're the ones to take Riley somewhere," whispered Sadness.

And somehow in those distant acoustics from the pit, Joy could hear Bing Bong the reverberation of "Take her to the moon for me."

Quite silly to put it that way. She knew that she couldn't literally take Riley to the moon, unless she somehow gave Riley the idea of being an astronaut, but she knew it meant taking Riley someplace better. Even if it meant, without him. Even if they were still figuring out where and what this "better" was.

* * *

Pre-bedtime was what Sadness coined "Riley's reminiscing time," to replay the orbs in Riley's head as a review of the day and the years. It would be a productive time to have Riley and everyone recap the days, all good and bad. It would help them all review the day and figure out the future.

Whenever daily activities were over, Joy and Sadness clattered through the keyboard, re-summoning and salvaging any memory remnants of Bing Bong they could get their hands on before the Forgetter workers could vacuum them into the abyss. Indeed, there were a few, but the orbs had dulled out, near expiration. Joy would clutch them, convincing herself that her warm touch could relit them. Even Sadness cradled them, but aside from the occasional splotches of blue tints, they could not revive to full color.

They did play on the projector, but they were blurred, faint renderings of little Riley babbling at phantom shades of him. And Joy would look away to avoid reliving his vanishing.

In the passing days, when Riley found the courage to join her classmates at lunch-tables and elicited the newly refurbished Friendship Island, the Bing Bong orbs would crack and slip into deeper distortion. Whenever rewinded, there was no more phantom, but just little Riley alone, giggling, chasing, embracing the thin air.

Nearing Riley's twelfth birthday, they disintegrated one-by-one.

The one consolation that Sadness gave Joy was that even matter that faded weren't necessary gone. They dissolved into invisible energy particles, never regaining full-substance, but still existing. So Joy felt that Bing Bong had decomposed into energy bits that crept in the air, leaning close to her to whisper his tune.

Joy fancied that he might reappear, re-exist in Riley's mind, and jovially resume his wanders in the corridors of Long-Term and Imagination Land. Joy pleaded the Train of Thought conductor and workers to inform her of any sightings of a cotton-candied sweet elephant-dolphin hybrid. But they would answer with confused shrugs.

By the eve of Riley's twelfth birthday, there was one last barely functional orb that contained Bing Bong. They had been so occupied with replaying the daydreams of chocolate cake with candles, new friends and family assembling at the hockey rink, packages with hockey gear, that they didn't notice the remaining orb until it seemed to call to them, " _Who's your happy friend..._ " with a mysterious amplification in volume.

But they couldn't even make out the memory. Fear bemoaned, "I think it's just about to..."

Sadness received it, her touch permeated bluish indentations on its gray surface. She gingerly bestowed it on the hovering area before the projector.

The scene had been gray tinted, like a malfunctioning television, like black and white films old timies.

But even through the graininess, Joy could recall that summer heat, the buzz of insects, the woosh of grass. Their old front yard in Minnesota.

It was just little Riley on the rainbowless wagon, and the vacant space behind her. Fear, Anger, Disgust rose from the sofa because the view from there did not satisfy them. But a closer look did not make the scene easier to decipher. The audio appeared disjointed with the broken record of Riley's babyish singing, _"Who's your happy friend... who's your happy friend... who's your happy friend..."_

The memory playback wavered and faded translucent, superimposed with the real-time scene of yet-to-be-twelve Riley staring into the mirror during a session of teeth-brushing.

The audio rolled on and experienced a eruption of self-repair, suddenly rendering the finale of lyrics. _"Who's your happy friend who likes to play? Who's rocket makes your shout hooray?"_ And this sprung up hope in Joy, that by some miraculous circumstances, that the recollection of these additional lyrics was a sign that Riley was recalling him. Could it possible?

 _"Who's your happy friend who likes to play? Who's rocket makes your shout..."_

But before she could search for an affirmation in Sadness, the orb disintegrated into sifting hourglass sand, floating up the tube.

And Riley stopped mid-brush and stared into the mirror.

Riley was drawn to the night sky before slumber, past-bedtime, hours short of her birthday. The emotions could only slump down on the sofa and try to count whatever stars were visible and admire the carved scars of craters on the moon.

Then the viewfinder became fogged through a slush of moisture, like how rainwater blurs a window view, and Joy and Sadness would never forget the sound of Riley's sigh.

The final memory of the night was a blue-golden swirled orb rolling into the memory banks.

It contained the stars and full moon.


End file.
